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Driving Mr. Albert: A Trip Across America with Einstein's Brain | 
 enlarge | Author: Michael Paterniti
Publisher: Dial Press
Category: Book
List Price: $10.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  101 reviews
Sales Rank: 185734
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 224
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 8.1 x 5.5 x 0.6
ISBN: 038533303X
Dewey Decimal Number: 616.07092
EAN: 9780385333030
ASIN: 038533303X
Publication Date: June 5, 2001
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Amazon.com Review
Driving Mr. Albert chronicles the adventures of an unlikely threesome--a freelance writer, an elderly pathologist, and Albert Einstein's brain--on a cross-country expedition intended to set the story of this specimen-cum-relic straight once and for all. After Thomas Harvey performed Einstein's autopsy in 1955, he made off with the key body part. His claims that he was studying the specimen and would publish his findings never bore fruit, and the doctor fell from grace. The brain, though, became the subject of many an urban legend, and Harvey was transformed into a modern Robin Hood, having snatched neurological riches from the establishment and distributed them piecemeal to the curious and the faithful around the world. The brain itself has seen better days, its chicken-colored chunks floating in a smelly, yellow, formaldehyde broth, yet its beatific presence in the book, riding serenely in the trunk of a Buick Skylark, encased in Tupperware, reflects the uncertainty of Einstein's life. Was he a sinner or a saint, a genius or just lucky? Harvey guards the brain as if it were his own. From time to time, he has given favored specialists a slice or two to analyze, but the results have been mixed. Physiologically, Einstein's brain may have been no different from anyone else's, but plenty of people would like the brain to be more than it is, including Paterniti: I want to touch the brain. Yes, I've admitted it. I want to hold it, coddle it, measure its weight in my palm, handle some of its fifteen billion now-dormant neurons. Does it feel like tofu, sea urchin, bologna? What, exactly? And what does such a desire make me? One of a legion of relic freaks? Or something worse? Traversing America with Harvey and his sacred specimen, Paterniti seems to be awaiting enlightenment, much as Einstein did in his last days. But just as the great scientist failed to come up with a unifying theory, Paterniti's chronicle dissolves at times into overly sincere efforts to find importance where there may be none, and it walks a fine line between postmodern detachment and wide-eyed wonderment. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, the book offers an engrossing portrait of postatomic America from what may be the ultimate late-20th-century road trip. --Therese Littleton
Product Description
Albert Einstein's brain floats in a Tupperware bowl in a gray duffel bag in the trunk of a Buick Skylark barreling across America. Driving the car is journalist Michael Paterniti. Sitting next to him is an eighty-four-year-old pathologist named Thomas Harvey, who performed the autopsy on Einstein in 1955 -- then simply removed the brain and took it home. And kept it for over forty years.
On a cold February day, the two men and the brain leave New Jersey and light out on I-70 for sunny California, where Einstein's perplexed granddaughter, Evelyn, awaits. And riding along as the imaginary fourth passenger is Einstein himself, an id-driven genius, the original galactic slacker with his head in the stars. Part travelogue, part memoir, part history, part biography, and part meditation, Driving Mr. Albert is one of the most unique road trips in modern literature.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 96 more reviews...
 AS A WRITER... January 29, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
...I must report with envy that I had to keep inturrupting the story to comment on how very much I was enjoying the writing. I rank this craftsman on a level with Charlie Pellegrino and David Guterson. I also publish and edit and I'm a wrtiting coach so I don't have a lot of read time these days, but this is one writer I brake for. The odd characters pop right off the page and run around the room and get you to thinking, "but don't I know this guy?"...and make you realize that they are living people just like Uncle Jake and grandad, and perhaps in some of the same ways, and this is what a really good wrtiter does-- make you see your own life with clarity. You drive this book like the author drove the car with the tupperware treasure (?) in the trunk, and the country materializes outside the windshield and in the diverse living-rooms where they sat and shared meals with typical Americans... all different, all slightly dysfunctional or dissatisfied or disturbing, again, like life... and the various aspects of living and questioning and trying and losing take form, with this journey as the alarm-clock, the wake-up call. Read it and don't be in so much of a hurry.
A fresh story and a unique style November 8, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I first picked up this book about three years ago, but with so little time to read, it just sat on my overcrowded bookshelf. I always joke to friends that I am a Book Buyer, not a Book Reader, and as a result my shelves are full of interesting tales just waiting for my life to slow down a bit so I can enjoy them.
I regret that I let this one sit idle for so long!
As a writer myself, I always appreciate a fresh story, and it has been a long time since I read a book that was this original. What began as an article in Harper's Weekly has been magnificently transformed into a real page-turner.
Author Michael Paterniti became interested in a story, an urban legend actually, about a pathologist named Dr. Thomas Harvey who was charged with performing Albert Einstein's autopsy and subsequently absconded with the genius's brain in 1955. For over 40 years, he has been preparing a study on his specimen, causing controversy at every turn. At best, some believe he is unqualified for such an important scientific task. At worst, he is accused of stealing something that did not rightfully belong to him.
Eventually Michael tracks him down, they become friends, of sorts, and ultimately embark on a road trip from New Jersey to California to meet with Einstein's granddaughter Evelyn.
The unlikely pair begin the cross-country journey of a lifetime, visiting museums and friends along the way, taking in the scenery, and trying to figure each other out. Michael is at a crossroads in his relationship with girlfriend Sara, and he uses the time to think about what she means to him, what their future might hold, and what he really wants out of life.
They stop at a strange cement sculpture museum called the Garden of Eden, created by "American maverick" Samuel Perry Dinsmoor. The museum's deceased founder's body is the grand finale of their tour, as they are led into a dark mausoleum with a coffin specially designed by Dinsmoor himself.
Michael and Dr. Harvey also stop at the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library & Museum, and a small place called the Bradbury Science Museum in Los Alamos, site of the infamous Manhattan Project that developed the atomic bomb.
I was struck by Michael's observation that "The museum...is most glaringly defined by what its curators seem to have forgotten about the bomb." He goes on to describe how the exhibits never mention the Enola Gay, the horrific aftermath of the explosions, or the scores of Japanese civilian casualties. It made me think about how powerful we curators are as the "editors" of history, how what we choose to leave out is sometimes as important as what we choose to include.
At times, the book is a bit repetitive, especially when the duo repeatedly orders their food in some slice of Americana diner, or when Dr. Harvey yet again dismisses Michael's request to see the brain for himself. But such episodes are not common in the pages of this book. (At times, the scientific explanations were a bit over this historian's head, but that is to be expected from someone who never set foot in a physics class - not even in high school!)
Seamlessly woven into the story, the author shares biographical snapshots of Einstein's life, insights from people who knew Dr. Harvey, and all kinds of tidbits to delight the trivia aficionado.
Michael's sense of humor really resonates. His writing style is readable, yet full of depth. His similes are original and his words are fresh. I wholeheartedly agree with the Boston Globe, who wrote, "In a world in which it seems that all the good ideas have been taken, it is singular."
I couldn't put it down. I'm only sorry I didn't pick it up sooner!
 Oddball travelogue... June 22, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
In Walter Isaacson's new biography, Einstein: His Life and Universe, he recommends Driving Mr. Albert: A Trip Across America with Einstein's Brain by Michael Paterniti. This book is filled with interesting facts, great observations, but above all, it's a fun read. Driving Mr. Albert reminds me of the oddball travelogues I've come to enjoy written by Tony Horwitz (Confederates in the Attic, Blue Latitudes, etc.).
When Einstein died in Princeton Hospital in 1955, the pathologist who performed the autopsy, Dr. Thomas Harvey, took the brain for himself. He did it without the permission of the family, but when it was discovered, the family allowed him to keep the brain provided that any results were to be published in scientific journals. Harvey rationalized his actions by saying that he wanted to research the brain to discover the key to Einstein's brilliance. Unfortunately, Harvey was not a neurologist and didn't really have the knowledge to perform a proper study of any brain, let alone Einstein's. He gave out parcels of the brain to various scientists, but until many decades after Einstein's death, nothing definitive was able to be determined. In the meantime, Harvey switched jobs, moved around the country, and all the while, he kept Einstein's brain with him.
A young writer, Michael Paterniti, became fascinated by the story of the brain and befriended Thomas Harvey when the doctor was 85 years old. Harvey mentioned that he'd like to travel to California to meet Evelyn Einstein, Einstein's step-granddaughter. So Paterniti volunteered to be his chauffeur, and they set out from New Jersey with pieces of Einstein's brain in tow. The main story is not the destination but the things that happen along the way. Some of the stops (like Los Alamos) have ties to Einstein, while others (Las Vegas) do not. Throughout the journey, Dr. Harvey remains almost as much of a mystery as the brain. Not only does he not reveal any secrets, but he is also reluctant to show the brain to Paterniti. Paterniti hopes for a glimpse of the brain--perhaps when Harvey falls asleep. He writes "I want to touch the brain. Yes, I've admitted it. I want to hold it, coddle it, measure its weight in my palm...Does it feel like tofu, sea urchin, bologna? What exactly? And what does that desire make me? One of the legion of relic freaks?"
Driving Mr. Albert is a great compliment to Isaacson's more serious and in-depth biography. Paterniti writes that "having Einstein's brain in the trunk rearranges the way you see everything." Reading Mr. Paterniti will rearrange the way you perceive Albert Einstein.
A Buick Skylark named Desire May 3, 2007
As Paterniti remarks in the prologue to the book, "Desire is a tricky thing." It can make even the most mundane activity the first step in a journey of unimaginable unraveling discovery, or it can just simply prolong the mundane. When a stalled career and a dissolving romantic situation left the author in a state of malaise and boredom, he was willing to try anything just to break the stagnation. What better cure, when the opportunity bizarrely presented itslef, than to take a cross country drive with the doctor who had performed the autopsy on Albert Einstein and who had absconded with the great scientist's brain; that the brain was still in the possession of this doctor and would make the same road trip, only made the desire more pronounced.
Thus was the unlikely partnership of Michael Paterniti, Dr. Thomas Harvey and Albert Einstein's pickled brain formed. Ostensibly, the purpose of this trip was so that Dr. Harvey could present what was left of Einstein's brain (there had been numerous pieces and bits sent out to brain experts over the years) to the scientist's granddaughter who was living at the time in Berkeley; and in performing this hadj, perhaps, absolve himself from all the criticism and guilt that Harvey had been living with ever since the autopsy. In spite of some very interesting characters encountered along the road (William Burroughs, literally on his last legs, makes a cameo appearance) the trip never lived up to a life transforming event for the three pilgrims, and slowly dwindled into the realm of the mundane: motels, greasy meals, and endless stretches of road, the by-products of any cross country drive.
Because even the most bizarre situation (like driving across America with Einstein's brain sloshing around in a Tupperware container) is only a temporary reprieve from the mundane, any book describing such freakish events shares the same danger. The book reads something like a Seinfeld episode, where nothing really happens but is so well presented that the audience is enthralled nevertheless. Paterniti has a nice style and in some descriptions even reaches the poetic, and throughout the book manages to keep the reader's interest. I don't, however, share some of the reviewers positive opinions of the author as a "travel writer." Paterniti makes too many mistakes. For example, he describes approaching Santa Fe, NM as zagging "through saguaro and scrub, in the shadow of the Jemez Mountains." Apparently the author and his editors need to do some research. There is not a saguaro anywhere (except maybe in a desert museum) on I-40, and the Jemez Mountains form the western backdrop for Santa Fe, not the eastern. Then again, this book deals quite a bit with relativity and just perhaps ....
It's not really a travelogue February 20, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book is first of all a research project of Albert Einstein and second a biography of Mr Harvey who saved Albert's brain for over 40 years. Then it's a memoir and philosophical rant of the author's feelings toward his girfriend Sara. The travel came in fourth as a backdrop to all of the above. Still, it's a very good read with a unique angle.
The book is well-written and well researched but at times during the read the author jumps from present to future or even the past and throws the reader off course. He'll write about a conversation with Harvey in the car and then jump with something like "after this trip I did some research on what Harvey said and discovered that..." which was unnecessary for the reader. It kept me from truly experiencing the STORY of the trip with Einstein's brain. He should have kept those comments for the end of the story.
I learned a lot about Einstein from reading this book, though. I learned that Einstein had little respect for women and had therefore trouble keeping a relationship. He had an illigitimate child. He seemed self-absorbed. And what truly fascinated me was how much Einstein was hounded by the FBI, both while alive and also post mortem. But how could a man with some proclaimed genius be so scatter-brained? He died at the age of 76 with signs of dymensia. His brain only weighed 2.7 pounds, which is no means a record.
I was hoping this book would be more of a travelogue, obviously, because I love traveling, both vicariously and in reality. On the first day together on the road with Mr Harvey, there is very little description of the landscape passing the passengers by. The New Jersey Turnpike gets mentioned on page 32, Philadelphia on page 39, The Susquehanna River on page 40, Columbus, OH on page 44, and the Indiana-Illinois border on page 59 as "two states conjoined like Siamese twins." If you haven't traveled I-70 as often as I have, then all this means nothing to you because nothing more gets mentioned of the surroundings during the trip. Those places are merely mentioned to pinpoint the reader on a map.
Things do wrap up better once the two reach Kansas and the trip really begins from there to California.
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